Melissas's gaze drifted somewhere far away.
The story the princess had asked her to narrate was a stain on their family - one that they couldn't erase even after five centuries. One that forced the daughters of the generations to come to hide their faces out of shame for their ancestor's deeds.
"Lady Autumn was her name," Melissa whispered.
"She was as beautiful as a maple leaf, hence the name. She was the eldest of the three daughters. She was calm, wise and held a gifted hearing."
"Hearing?" Vivia blinked once.
"Some daughters of my family are born to possess gifted hearing - one that lets them hear God's voice," her soft voice was slow and measured.
Vivia, if she was being honest, faced quite some challenge to catch her soft-spoken voice. But she was determined to use her ears to their fullest capacity today.
Women who can hear voices…? Why does it feel so familiar?
"God's voice would whisper to them and they, in turn, would recite the prophecies. The daughter with the gifted hearing would realize this significance when she turned eight."
"Ah! Madam Drisennia from Casca's festival!"
The trio gave her a look of surprise. Vivia cleared her throat, embarrassed by her outburst.
"Apologies. I just remembered Madam Drisennia. She's a fortune teller I met in the Demon Realm's festival. She, too, said that the matriarchs of her family could hear voices when they'd turn eight."
Melissa stared at her, then looked distant. "I see…Yes, that sounds right. We weren't sure, but we would feel that there might be sisters on the other side too."
She paused speaking for several long minutes, absorbing this news. Her lips seemed to quiver faintly beneath her veiled mask. Judith offered to feed her a cookie, but she declined politely. So Judith ate it herself and licked her fingers clean.
"Lady Autumn heard God's voice when she turned eight. A voice that whispered her own imminent demise in the near future."
Vivia froze.
The first whisper in an eight-year-old's mind was that she was going to die soon?
A surge of fury towards this God engulfed Vivia. For a child who was just beginning to understand the world with her little steps, the future of an impending death was grim - too grim to digest.
"The prophecy was cruel. Prophecies are meant to come true. It's what we believe. We are simply God's messengers. Yet my family protected my ancestor with everything they could to never let that prophecy come true. They sheltered her from all the harm and vices."
Melissa fell silent once again. Her eyes moved and caught a shadow behind a pillar. She retracted her gaze with poise.
"The difficult years of childhood and youth passed. Our family began to feel relieved. Lady Autumn grew up to be a healthy and intelligent woman, and she soon turned twenty-two. It was when she heard another voice. A deadly drought was soon to befall in the Human Realm. Innocent lives would be lost."
Vivia swallowed, her heart racing faster and faster. Five hundred years later, the tension of the past still seeped into her body as if something catastrophic would happen, even though all of this had already come to a pass.
"It was also around the same time as a convoy from Rudaheim arrived in Emberlain."
A convoy?
"It was a little more than five hundred years ago. Relations between the two realms were worsening. There was no proper system to share food and water, and both wanted to leverage the power they had. The result? Innocent people were suffering in this tit for tat game to become the supreme power."
Vivia grew solemn. She had heard from her master who would occasionally recall the era. The years, especially approaching the imminent war, had felt more brutal and animalistic. The two races loathed each other, and more so the fact that one realm lacked water source and another lacked fertile land to grow crops.
"Lack of food and water forced humans and demons to meet their untimely deaths," Melissa looked somber and closed her eyes.
"The death toll kept increasing. Our family desperately conveyed Lady Autumn's prophecy to the palace. This had to stop before it was too late. The then King relented, and it seemed like the Rudaheim King, too, had come to a similar understanding on his side. Hence, the two agreed to meet as one, final desperate attempt at some kind of peaceful resolution. And so the demon convoy came here."
She exhaled a small breath. "Which was when everything changed."
—
Rudaheim.
"It's my great-uncle who lives in Casca," Andras said. "He hated the small town of Nethermoor and ran away when he was young. We reunited a few years back when I came to Casca to make a name for myself.
Zerath remembered that Belphegor, Andras's father, would sometimes mention of his troublesome uncle.
Guess that's him.
"The subject of the runaway son was always a heated debate in my house, so I didn't look at him too favorably. But then I thought that it was probably because of him that my parents were much more open to me leaving for the capital city. They likely didn't want another runaway son in their family."
Fenrik said, still chugging down Zerath's stew, "I don't blame that uncle. Living in that town doesn't seem so exciting."
Andras glowered. "A demon belonging to a Blessed family shouldn't be discriminating between a town and a city I believe."
"People have been discriminating against my family for centuries over something ridiculous, so excuse me for my teensy tiny discrimination over something equally ridiculous," he shrugged, completely nonchalant.
Ugh! I don't like this brat at all! And that's my lord's food!
He wished he could drop a knuckle on his arrogant lump of a head. But he controlled his ire and continued.
"Anyway. My great-uncle was very happy to see me. He told me lots of stories about our great ancestor - who was also once a chef. A valiant chef who served at the time of the Great War and who also happened to meet our revered Varkhail.
Zerath raised his brow, his fingers drifting to the hilt of his sword - the same sword his father claimed belonged to the revered hero.
Fenrik's eyes narrowed. "The hero? Isn't he a mythical person?"
Slavien said, "You don't believe the Varkhail existed?"
He scoffed. "Do you think a single, lone man could have had the ability to stop that deadly war?"
Zerath ignored their banter and asked, "Who is this ancestor?"
"Well… my great-uncle doesn't know his name. Maybe Father would know it. He has the family registry, though I'm not sure if the ancestry records run back to more than five hundred years ago. Anyway, this ancestor of mine ran a popular restaurant at that time in Casca and earned decent money. He had a good family too. But things took a turn for the worse during the war."
A beat of silence ensued in respect for the departed souls.
"The war, slowly but eventually, brought famine in our realm. My ancestor tried to hold on for as far as he could but ultimately, he had to shut down his restaurant. There were simply no ingredients left in the stock to make food out of. All his savings ran out soon enough. But he was a strong-willed demon who refused to give up. And thus, he set out on a long journey."
"Journey?" Slavien tilted his head.
"Well, this part is a little fuzzy indeed, and there're no records of it. But apparently, my great-uncle boasts about how my ancestor suffered many trials and tribulations to be able to grow crops in our soil."
Everybody's eyes widened at that.
"That's impossible!" Fenrik was quick to discredit this. "Our realm's soil is too unsuitable to sustain any crops. Haven't all our previous ancestors tried and failed? Even magic doesn't work. How could your ancestor have possibly achieved this? I…smell a lie."